Wow, was I wrong - The Bear and Badger

mk64

Escape wrote:

Derren Brown's a good shout.

I always knew his magic was stooge-heavy, but used to think he enjoyed the rewards of complexity because of his card skills. Turns out he's fine with the cheapest of the cheap if it keeps him on telly.

More disappointed than wrong, but I was wrong about him.

(I mean it's every magician's prerogative to let us think that what they do is more technical than it is, but Brown's entire rep was built on a public desire for high-execution craft. That's how he presented himself, and that's what I bought into.)

What's your evidence for this? Just curious as I've seen him a few times.

Kow

FranticPea wrote:

I thought the thing about telling how people died (in battle, wounded, naturally etc) by the way their horse was stood in a statue was true. It was my interesting fact to tell people. Turns out I've bullshitted a lot of people.Â

Damn it!

Escape

mk64 wrote:

Just curious as I've seen him a few times.

I haven't, but I've heard from those who have that he's much better live because he incorporates a lot more trad magic. After the Lottery fiasco it's hard to go back to his old telly tricks and believe he made them any harder than necessary.

Jerry Sadowitz has always rated Brown's ability but hated his approach. Ditto Simon Singh. To be impressed by Brown relies on the viewer's trust in his conduct - to be taken in by the proposed difficulty, and he's lost that. A few of his tricks not only rely on stooges, they rely on your belief he wouldn't use them.

But then he has always admitted he'd be nowhere without New-Ageism. Paul Daniels is also a great cardsman...

Kow

I have seen that Brown thing The Devil's something or other where he explains card tricks. They are actually far more impressive when you know how they are done. Incredible dexterity and sleight of hand.

Skerret

I never thought that Kow believed that thingÂ how people died (in battle, wounded, naturally etc) by the way their horse was stood in a statue.

Kow

That's a fairly short term belief.

Escape

Kow wrote:

They are actually far more impressive when you know how they are done. Incredible dexterity and sleight of hand.

But there's no TV money in them any more. His only hope there would be to piggy-back Bond somehow, with a Top Gear-level production on the visual side.

Beats watching Chris Ryan on a bit of shonky bridgework with Del's hocus-pocus comms.

Skerret

Kow wrote:

That's a fairly short term belief.

It was unshakeable though, until now.

Jacuzzi_Jackson

Escape wrote:

mk64 wrote:

Just curious as I've seen him a few times.

I haven't, but I've heard from those who have that he's much better live because he incorporates a lot more trad magic. After the Lottery fiasco it's hard to go back to his old telly tricks and believe he made them any harder than necessary. Jerry Sadowitz has always rated Brown's ability but hated his approach. Ditto Simon Singh. To be impressed by Brown relies on the viewer's trust in his conduct - to be taken in by the proposed difficulty, and he's lost that. A few of his tricks not only rely on stooges, they rely on your belief he wouldn't use them. But then he has always admitted he'd be nowhere without New-Ageism. Paul Daniels is also a great cardsman...

So you have no evidence then?

I'm not a Derren Brown fan boy or anything but i've seen him live and the apparent randomness of the people he picks from the audience would make me sceptical of heavy usage of stooges or impressed thoroughly with the feigned randomness.

If you can throw a frisbee into the second tier of a theatre and land it in the hands of a pre-planted stooge with your back to the audience then fair play. The wild curve of his blind throws into a sea of people he can't see because of stage light makes it impressive in itself OR it genuinely is random which then makes the following trick more impressive.

WorKid

Jesus Christ

acemuzzy

Santa Claus

Escape

MORTALS! You defy the Gods?!

Jacuzzi_Jackson wrote:

If you can throw a frisbee into the second tier of a theatre and land it in the hands of a pre-planted stooge with your back to the audience then fair play.

Yes, there must be some sort of a catch.

(What's the trick?)

[Deleted User]

It makes me laugh that no-one who belives this shit ever questions why Jesus would appear on some shitty rag or a piece of toast.

Jacuzzi_Jackson

I love Jesus toast.

[Deleted User]

It's the best variety, nothing tastes quite like tepid, marmite, crusty, saviour face.

djchump

Liveinadive wrote:

It makes me laugh that no-one who belives this shit every questions why Jesus would appear on some shitty rag or a piece of toast.

errr... the Turin Shroud was supposed to be his death shroud, i.e. the big bit of linen he was wrapped up in after he was crucified and buried behind that big rock thing. The idea was that the magic hot heat from him coming back to life all magic like burnt his face and stuff into the shroud. Or something. So it was handy that his hands were covering up his junk so that the holy cock and balls weren't imprinted.

[Deleted User]

Shitty rag like I said

Jacuzzi_Jackson

Doesn't bread represent the body of Christ as well? So Jesus Toast is of course utterly understandable.

JESUS TOAST!

FranticPea

I must admit that I was very impressed after seeing Derren Brown having been dragged there by the Missus. The frisbee thing, if it's a trick in itself, is fucking mind blowing.

Mod74

It was all part of the holy relic craze.

We can laugh but I'm not sure future generations will judge Furby's or Pogs any kinder.

[Deleted User]

LOL
The great POG crusades of '93.

[Deleted User]

Kow wrote:

I've read a David Icke book. It was a tremendous laugh. Highly recommended.

Mug! The guy thinks that the owl burning thing is religious human sacrafice, he's the son of god and the Bush family and the 'Windsors' are lizards from space, afaik. Have I missed anything?

I bought that Ronson book btw, just haven't started it.

Jacuzzi_Jackson

FranticPea wrote:

I must admit that I was very impressed after seeing Derren Brown having been dragged there by the Missus. The frisbee thing, if it's a trick in itself, is fucking mind blowing.

It almost seems to impressive to be a trick. Surely if he could do that he'd just do it as a trick "look i'm going to close my eyes, throw this frisbee high into the crowd and its going to land in the hands of that person there" BOOM. Amazing.

MattyJ

As always, the more impressive thing with the Turin Shroud is two things:

1) That even though it's been carbon dated and proven to be fake some still believe it

2) Someone actually made it

Escape

I'm interested about this frisbiz now.

How many does he throw? Are they small? How dark is it? Can the subsequent trick be achieved with one stooge?

If it's dark enough, he throws them fast enough to prevent you from watching them all, and the venue's not too deep, he could chuck one away and have his man whip one out.

My only complaint is that he hangs his magic on the gullibility of his audience's pseudo-reasoning ahead of physical, when it's cracking stuff on its own.

(There is such a thing as a random stooge; e.g. anyone who's ever been hypnotised on stage.)

Mod74

I don't even know what trick you're talking about, but come on, the trick isn't in who catches the frisbee.

Escape

Seems not, but it does hinge on the audience's belief that randomising the punters matters.

mk64

The DB thing is interesting, i've seen him fuck tricks up where i've blatantly seen how he was doing it. Some of the tricks are a case of the way he did it was the only conceivable way he could have done it - if you are not mis-directed.

The drawing stuff is all just hypnosis and suggestion. People getting impressed with Hypnosis need to wake up a bit

The trick where he looked at people and told them their lives was quite eerie. Cold reading type thing. He claims it was genuine. I'm inclined to believe some parts. I do believe that some parts of the country have really small gene pools and can be traced back to certain names within a few generations. The facial characteristics and accent could be simple giveaways to this. From there you can guess stuff from the placement of the person and their potential upbringing etc. Must admit when he gets into the real detail i dont know how he does that.

I'm not in the same camp as you yet escape in re: to DB

WorKid

Ask their name. Google them.

igorgetmeabrain

Derren Brown's clearly not very good at throwing and thus couldn't possibly pick out a stooge from a packed theatre audience.

He makes a point of stating quite vehemently that he uses no stooges at the beginning of every single TV programme, theatre show etc that he does, so it's entirely on trust that people believe him. Â I find it strange that, since he relies on this assertion almost entirely for his credibility as a performer, no stooge that he's ever used has ever revealed themselves to the public. Â Would make quite a news story.

I don't know what he was thinking though when he did that lottery stunt though. Â Major disaster that one.

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